newjerseynewsroom.com

Rock musical about a real-life ‘60s sister act proves to be a bummer

BY MICHAEL SOMMERS

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

OFF BROADWAY REVIEW

A new musical based on a true story, “The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World” is the late ‘60s saga of three talent-free teen sisters whose blue-collar dad obsessively drives them to become a rock band.

Opening on Tuesday at Playwrights Horizons, this musical with a script by Joy Gregory, music by Gunnar Madsen and lyrics by both, turns out to be a joyless and increasingly dispiriting event.

One can see how the makers could be intrigued by this show biz tale of clueless girls and a relentless parent – it’s not unlike “Gypsy!” – but the characters they develop are so vague and pathetic and their plot’s trajectory is so downbeat that “The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World” is no fun at all.

Peter Friedman nearly busts a gut trying to rage like Mandy Patinkin as the deluded New Hampshire mill worker who envisions his kids as future stars, but it’s obvious from the get-go that these dowdy, lank-haired sisters played by Jamey Hood, Sarah Sokolovic and Emily Walton have neither musical ability nor any ambition to make something of themselves. Their lamentable efforts to rock out are painful.

The family’s meager savings are squandered on producing a record that never gets airtime. One sister rashly weds a nerdy neighbor. The stressed dad suffers a heart attack. An ironic epilogue ten years later sees The Shaggs’ record acclaimed by rock savants as an avant-garde masterpiece.

Perhaps this bleak narrative might be chewy were it developed as an indie movie or even as a satirical tuner in the manner of “A Mighty Wind,” but earnestly rendered here as serious musical theater it’s merely dead meat.

Performed by a four-member band, Madsen’s music reflects rock and pop tunes of the 1960s; perhaps the sweetest is the bluesy ballad “Flyin’,” which benefits from its touching interpretation by Annie Golden, who appealingly portrays the girls’ wistful drudge of a mom.